States address moped laws for 2011

January 4, 2011

USA Today reports several states are considering revising moped laws. Some states have ambiguous laws that confuse scooters with mopeds, don’t adequately address safety concerns, and in some cases encourage drunk riding. Other states are looking at helmet laws, at least for younger riders.

Comments

5 Responses to “States address moped laws for 2011”

Brooke on
January 4th, 2011 11:00am

What a horrible, horrible horrible article. Washington already requires helmets on every two wheeler. While they don’t require a special motorcycle license for 50cc street legal machines, you still need a drivers license. It’s this complete failure of reporters to string together the correct words to represent ideas that is really the root of the problem (outside of S. Carolina, a place that’s best to just not think about too much.)

illnoise on
January 4th, 2011 2:22pm

Yes, the other thing it doesn’t address is that if you look at the legislative docket of any state at any given time, there are thousands of goofy proposed laws in committee that will never see a vote, let alone the light of day, ABATE and other (in my opinion) reactionary groups love to dive on these to rile up bikers.

I mean, I appreciate what ABATE and the AMA do for motorcycling, but, they tend to focus on hot-button issues and seem to always take an aggressive and uncompromising libertarian view. I don’t think that’s always in the best interest of motorcycling, but the MSF and I are apparently in the minority.

Libertarians are just Republicans who want to legalize pot and prostitution. IOW, privatize all reward and socialize all risk, plus walk around thinking they sprang forth from the head of Zeus, and could be exactly where they were if they were to have been born in Somalia.
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Here’s the bullet – They picked him b/c of an insane law he signed that requires you to have the FACTORY OEM exhaust on your bike or face a stiff fine. So, when the $700 oem exhaust rots off of your GTS300, you’re not allowed to replace it with a less expensive performance part, even if that performance part is under the US EPA mandated 82 db’s.

So, if the $3000 factory exhaust rots off your VW you’re allowed to replace it with any aftermarket system you want (performance or economy) as long as it meets EPA standards. If you own a motorcycle it’s a totally different story.

FireJ on
January 9th, 2011 9:25pm

I give alot of credit to Scooter riders most use helmets and eye protection, I say that gritting my teeth , because here in Florida I think we have more people rent scooters then any other state, and most never have Helmets, Eye Protection or footwear or tshirts for that matter…

if it rolls on the road all the same terms should apply as they do to the laws in your state….